


Bullets and Cupcakes: We'll Make History

by threemeows



Series: Bullets and Cupcakes [3]
Category: To All the Boys I've Loved Before (Movies), To All the Boys I've Loved Before Series - Jenny Han
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-12 18:07:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29388879
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/threemeows/pseuds/threemeows
Summary: The third and final installment of alternate universe assassins/spies/whatever shenanigans. Spoilers for the third movie.
Relationships: Peter Kavinsky & Lara Jean Song-Covey, Peter Kavinsky/Lara Jean Song-Covey
Series: Bullets and Cupcakes [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1649959
Comments: 92
Kudos: 78





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from the song "Duet" by Rachael Yamagata.

“Agent Covey.”

Lara Jean just turns the page in her ragged paperback. Anyone passing through the hotel bar would think she’s just a regular young woman, seated comfortably on a bench waiting to be seated. And that’s what she needs to convey.

“So,” she says, not really reading the words on the page. “We’re back to ‘Agent’ now, huh?”

She can’t really take a good look at him, to see if he’s all right. He’s got his hood up – seated directly next to her, but his back towards her. She swallows, daring a glance –

“Don’t look at me.”

She goes back to her book, resists the urge to bite her lip – the need to look and feel worried. _Get a hold of yourself._

“Where have you been?” she says, instead – clipped, professional. Like she really is back to being an agent of The Company. _You practically are._ It took back-channel string pulling from both Trevor and Lucas – not to mention all the shit she’s pulled within the past few weeks – to finally get to this point. “Peter. Trevor is –” She stops, almost shakes her head. Things were tense and strange between them before he left, and she knows some of it is her fault and they’ve got to deal with it eventually, but she’s got to be honest now. “ _I’m_ really worried. They said you went AWOL. That you were on a classified mission and that you – ”

“I gotta go.”

“ _Wha –_ ”

“I’m being tailed,” he says. “Can you meet me later?”

She turns the page – leans back with her free hand on the bench. Peter sets down a coffee cup next to her hand. She waits a beat, then takes the coffee cup and takes a sip. Written on the cardboard sleeve, where the barrista would’ve scrawled someone’s name, is an address and room number.

Beside her, Peter gets up – stretches. She expects him to leave without another word, but then suddenly feels his mouth on the back of her head – brief, but sure, and she closes her eyes, overwhelmed. She wants to tell him to be careful. She wants to yell at him for breaking cover – for everything that’s happened, that’s _been_ happening. But mostly, she wants to turn around and hug him tight and keep him here and safe and sound and that’s just not –

He’s gone.

Lara Jean takes a deep, quelling breath. She finishes the last paragraph she was on to right herself. Then she slides _Pride and Prejudice_ into her handbag, and heads for the revolving doors, into the night.

*

_She began now to comprehend that he was exactly the man who, in disposition and talents, would most suit her. His understanding and temper, though unlike her own, would have answered all her wishes. It was an union that must have been to the advantage of both; by her ease and liveliness, his mind might have been softened, his manners improved, and from his judgment, information, and knowledge of the world, she must have received benefit of greater importance. But no such happy marriage could now teach the admiring multitude what connubial felicity really was._

-tbc-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> obviously, this scene is taken from the third movie, which made me crack up. the quote at the end is from Pride & Prejudice. 
> 
> I LITERALLY HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I'M GONNA DO WITH THIS FIC BUT HI, I SAW THE THIRD MOVIE, AND I'M A BIT EMOSH. A *BIT*.


	2. Chapter 2

Lara Jean tugs the hood of her coat further down her eyes – keeps her head low as she exist the elevator, her gait brisk but not particularly hurried. Up ahead, a maid exits a room, carrying dirty towels. Just as she’s about to dump them in her cart, Lara Jean bumps into her.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” Lara Jean murmurs in Czech, subtly slipping her fingers into the maid’s apron pocket to grab the master card key, before moving on her way down the hall.

476 . . . 478 . . . 480. She stops, checking over her shoulder – the maid is making her way to the elevator bank. She waits until she makes the turn, then presses the key to the lock. The little mechanical whiz, followed by the blinking green light, makes her heart leap into her throat in anticipation – she presses the door knob down and pushes forward, inside.

The room is utterly dark. She doesn't have time to call out Peter's name before the door clicks shut behind her.

The room floods with light – almost completely blinding – and she reacts instinctively, her training kicking in despite her retirement. She flips the dagger from her coat sleeve, brings her arm up and let’s loose, but someone knocks the knife away and it embeds in the side wall, and now she’s staring down at the barrel of a gun – right up at Peter.

There’s a beat where they just stare at each other, breathing hard, and then Peter says, almost jokingly, “What? You don’t knock like a normal person?”

Lara Jean licks her lips, too shocked to say anything but the truth, “I’m not a normal person.”

That’s why they’re here, right? They’re both very much not normal.

She holds up the maid’s master card key between two fingers. Peter nods slowly and slides his gun into his inner jacket pocket. Then he looks down at her and says, charmingly, like nothing’s happened – like he hasn’t not seen her in months, like the past year where everything imploded around them never occurred –

“Hi, Covey.”

She could seriously punch him.

Instead, Lara Jean launches herself at him, throwing her arms around his neck in relief before kissing him soundly on the mouth. Then she remembers – _bad, bad idea_ – and drops back to her heels, lays her cheek against his chest. They never did talk things through. They were supposed to, and then he disappeared for a while – like he does, because he has to – and then Trevor came and told her something had happened – and they’re not, technically speaking, together. It was all a mess, it’s _still_ a mess, and she just made things even messier.

“Sorry,” she murmurs. “I didn’t mean – I mean, I did, but not – ”

“S’okay,” he murmurs back, his voice a low, comforting rumble underneath her cheek. “I get it.” He hesitates, then says, so softly she can barely hear it, “I missed you.”

Lara Jean squeezes her already closed eyes a bit tighter, willing the tears back. She succeeds, but barely. “I missed you more.” Then she lets go, to get a proper look at him. He doesn’t look terribly hurt. There’s a tiny white bandage over his left brow, the skin a faded yellow on his right cheekbone. She picks up both his hands, and looks at his knuckles. They’re in bad condition – split and scabbed all over.

“I’ve had worse,” he says, which is the same thing he said to her in Portland, at the house – “their” house – and she blinks back some more tears.

“Yes,” she says, tremulously, “it looks like he gave as good as you got – and then some.”

He grins ruefully, proud of her little boast.

“You good?” she whispers.

“Good now,” he promises.

She sucks in her lips, then nods towards the table and two chairs. They sit down across from each other, and she sets down her handbag and begins pulling out things. A brown paper bag – a wrinkled, thick white envelope – and as many weapons as she could carry, from her leftover stash. “I didn’t know what you’d need,” she says, almost babbling. “I figured whatever I could get past airport security – ”

“Thanks,” he says, wolfing down the sandwich like it’s the first time he’s eaten in days. Concerned, she sets down the extra clips of ammo and watches him finish.

“Here,” she says, after he’s done and, seemingly exhausted, sits back in his chair and stairs up at the ceiling. She hands him the envelope.

He sits up and opens it. “There’s at least 10k in here,” he says, shocked.

“Twelve,” she says, simply. “I figured you were getting low. There hasn’t been activity in your personal or Company-issued accounts. Lucas checked.”

“I didn’t want to raise red flags,” he says, grimly.

“I thought so,” she says. “Take it.”

“How’d you get it?” he asks. When she doesn’t answer, he says, more quietly, “Covey, your shop – ”

“It’s fine,” she says, evenly. “Now that the reno is complete, I’m bringing in money again. It’s a little tight, but I can make do.”

“I’ll pay you back,” he says, immediately. “After this is all over, I’ll pay you back.”

She looks away. “Yes. About that. What is – what is ‘this’?”

He heaves a big sigh, and folds his arms on the table. “Covey – ”

“No, don’t,” she says, forcefully, and suddenly terrified that they’re circling down this same drain again – of not telling each other things. “I’m tired of this, Peter. I thought I knew what I was getting into but – but this isn’t fair. It wasn’t fair of me to ask you to stay with me, to make all these sacrifices for me, despite still being in the Company.” He starts to speak, but she lifts up her hand, “Just let me finish, okay? It wasn’t fair. And it’s not fair for you to not tell me things. And not just what’s going on now. Everything.” She swallows. “We have to talk about it, but now is not the time. Just – let me know what’s going on now. I put my neck out on the line for you, for this. Trevor and Lucas did too. So, please just – ”

“Stop. Stop, stop,” he says, face pained. “I was gonna say I’ll tell you everything.”

She blinks at him. “O-oh.”

“Yeah. Oh.”

She sighs, and lets all the breath that she didn’t know she was holding out of her in one gush. “Okay.”

“Okay,” he says, almost laughingly, and she snickers and starts to lay her head down on the table, exhausted.

He reaches over and presses his forehead to hers, cups the back of her head. “You were tripping out,” he mumbles, bemused.

This time, some tears fall, but for some reason – maybe it’s the adrenaline – she’s still kind of giggling. “I was scared _,_ ” she says, in explanation, which only makes him laugh harder – and despite the absolutely craziness of the situation, she does, too.

-tbc-

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> scene and dialogue obviously adapted from the third movie :)


	3. Chapter 3

“It was an A level payload.”

  
  
Lara Jean sucks in a breath, tries not to rub her upper arms. “I figured,” she mutters, though the confirmation is still chilling. The Company would not be this freaked out if it was otherwise.

  
  
She ignores the other part, the unsaid part - that an A level payload would mean millions off his Company debt. She used to dream of that - the day he’d get out. An A level payload would guarantee that. She doesn’t have to ask why he took the op.

  
  
Peter stands up and walks over to the window, checks through the sliver of curtain. Lara Jean can see it’s started to rain, droplets splattering against the glass. 

  
  
“Yeah. They wouldn’t even tell me what was in the cargo. Just to take down the target, any and all protective services, get the cargo. Didn’t even matter to them if there were witnesses.”

  
  
_Jesus_. She fiddles with her fingers, nervous and afraid and trying desperately not to show it. “What happened?” She swallows. “Trevor told me you are officially designated as AWOL. That he just barely talked them down from ordering shoot to kill to just apprehend and retrieve.”

  
Peter turns, leans against the window, arms crossed. His head dips as he studies the gaudy pattern of the hotel room carpet. “Another assassin. Whatever’s in the cargo has other people really nervous too. To protect my payload, I had to abort and shift the target.”  
  


Lara Jean chews the inside of her cheek. Something doesn’t make sense. “Okay. So why didn’t you take out the new target? Why didn’t you tell Boss, and re-assess and change mission parameters?”  
  


Peter pinches the bridge of his nose. “Because the other assassin is my father.”  
  


She stares at him, her jaw dropping open in shock. “W-what?”  
  


“Yeah,” Peter chokes out a bitter laugh. “Yup. Yeah. It’s - uh, it’s nuts.”  
  


“Did you know - I mean - before he -”

  
“No. Not a clue.”  
  


Lara Jean scratches her temple, confused and full of cold dread. She can remember what it was like, finding out about her mother - about the real reasons behind her death. But she can’t imagine what it would be like for Peter, after his father had abandoned the family. “Okay,” she says. “Wow.”  
  


“Yeah.” Peter is staring off into space. He looks a little dazed himself.   
  


“What happened next?”  
  


Peter plays with his fingernails. “Dragged him to my safe house. I -“ He stops, laughs bitterly, and drags his hand through his hair. “I swear to god, I was gonna kill him. I was gonna interrogate the subject, and then eliminate. I was within Company rights. But then he -” Peter shakes his head, looks away. “He convinced me not to. Said he had an explanation. And then Hewitt’s men found us. We got separated. He said he’d find me. I’ve been on the run ever since.” He sits down heavily at the table, winded. “He played me.”  
  


Stricken, she murmurs, “You don’t know that.”  
  


“It’s been three weeks,” he points out. “Nothing to show for it. Should’ve known better.”  
  


Lara Jean refrains from pointing out the obvious alternative - that his father could very well be dead. It’s because she can tell from his posture that he’s holding on to years’ worth of anger, simmering in the bow of his shoulders. It’s all that he has left.   
  


She grabs his hand, squeezes it tightly. “Hey,” she says, softly. “Hey.” When he finally looks up, she smiles, tremulous but sure at him. “We’ll figure it out. We’ll - we’ll get to Hewitt. We’ll retrieve the cargo, and Boss will -“  
  


“No,” Peter says, squeezing back. “No way. It’s way too dangerous - you really shouldn’t have come here at all. And after everything that’s happened -“  
  


He stops, and she swallows, remembering. The cascade hit on her ... her confusion about Gen and John Ambrose ... god, finding out about Ryan, in the way that she found about him ... Peter nearly dying in front of her eyes ... surviving the hit on her life ... everything that’s happened doesn’t begin to cover it, couldn’t possibly. And yet ...   
  


“Peter, I had to,” she whispers. “I couldn’t just let you - it’s _because_ of everything that’s happened ...” She looks down - realizes he’s got her hand in both of his, and pulls away, clears her throat. Now is not the time. There are too many things going on. “It’s late. Tomorrow we can game plan. We should get some rest.”  
  


“ ... Yeah, yeah right.”  
  


Lara Jean tries to ignore the way his voice sounded. Instead, she looks around the room. There’s a small couch and the bed. She gets up and goes to the couch, lifting up the cushions.   
  


“Uh, what are you doing?”   
  


“Looking for the pull-out handle.” Her handle grapples blindly but ... “Oh. Shit.” It’s not a pull-out bed. “Well,” she mumbles, replacing the cushions. “I’ll just ...” She goes to the closet, grabs the extra blanket and pillow, and settles them on the couch before sitting down and removing her sneakers.   
  


“Covey, come on, I’ll take the couch,” he says, affronted.   
  


She looks up skeptically at him.   
  


“What?”  
  


“You’re tall, I’m short, this couch is better fit for a dollhouse. Now is not the time for chivalry. You need your rest.”  
  


He squats down before her. “What if I don’t?” he asks, smirking.   
  


Lara Jean looks at him, half-suspicious, half-smiling. “You” - she light taps his forehead - “wouldn’t dare.”  
  


He tilts his head at her. And then suddenly grabs her around the waist and hauls her up, over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.   
  


“Peter!” she shrieks, laughing, as he tickles her and then unceremoniously dumps her on the bed, breathless with giggles. Before she can push up onto her elbows, he’s flopped down on the couch, pulling the blanket over his shoulder as he turns his back on her. 

  
“‘Night, Covey,” he calls. 

  
Lara Jean huffs and crawls up the bed to plump the pillows and shut off the light. She snuggles down and breathes deeply. From the other side of the room, she can hear Peter shifting on the couch, trying to get comfortable. Quietly, she sits up and watches his shadow struggle. 

  
“Peter?”

  
“ ... Yep?”

  
“Your legs are hanging off the couch.”

  
“So?”

  
“That can’t be very comfortable.”

  
“How do you know? I like losing feeling in my legs.”

  
Lara Jean giggles behind her hand - she can hear him snicker too. “Come on,” she says, lifting the corner of the blanket. 

  
Peter sits up. “Uh -” She can almost see him rub the back of his neck, awkward. “ - That wasn’t a - I wasn’t -“

  
“I know. I’m not either. Get over here.” He sighs and shuffles over. As he lies down next to her, she says, teasingly, “It’s your own fault for being so tall. Long legs, gigantic feet -“

  
He glares at her, then promptly reaches over and tickles her until she’s breathless all over again. “Okay okay, truce?” she gasps out, trying to twist away. 

  
He stops tickling, but doesn’t let go. “Truce.” And then he pulls her until she’s lying on his chest - like they used to do, when he managed to come back from an op and she was done from her day at the bakery, before everything decided to implode all around them. 

  
“Peter?” she whispers, when she can feel herself on the edge of sleep. She’s not sure he’s not asleep himself, but then comes the sleepy, “Mmm?”

  
“I know we still need to - you know - talk about everything.” She yawns, and snuggles deeper. “But ... I just wanted to let you know. I’m sorry.”

  
He doesn’t respond for the longest time. Maybe he did fall asleep. But then he whispers, “I’m sorry, too.” She feels him hook his finger under her chin, to lift her face - then, a light kiss on the tip of her nose, and another on her lips, lingering but close-mouthed. He inhales, but pulls away, and she can just barely see his expression in the darkness - contrite, and worried, and sincere - and that he’s not going to press further. 

  
She can feel some tears threatening to spill over, so she sets her head back on his chest. “Get some rest,” she murmurs. 

  
She didn’t fool him. He wipes a few tears from her cheek, tightens his arms around her, but mercifully doesn’t say anything. 

  
*

  
A phone chimes. 

  
Lara Jean feels Peter stir underneath her. She sits up, blinking - it’s still dark, although she can see daylight is coming. It’s not her phone - that’s still in her purse, on the table across the room. 

  
Peter reaches for his phone on the nightstand. His mouth is set in a firm line when he reads the text. Then he wipes his hand across his face. 

  
“How’d he get your burner number?” Lara Jean asks, confused. 

  
He shakes his head, shrugging. “One of a million other mysteries,” he mutters, handing the phone to her to look. 

  
A set of coordinates. And another message -

  
_Bring your friend too._

  
-tbc-


End file.
